


you promise me heaven (then put me through hell)

by wolfwithdragon



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man homecoming 2017
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Angst, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, Irondad, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Post-Spider-Man: Homecoming, Self-Harm, Suicidal Thoughts, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark Has A Heart, spiderson
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-16
Updated: 2019-07-19
Packaged: 2020-06-29 11:33:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19829317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolfwithdragon/pseuds/wolfwithdragon
Summary: (immediately follows the events of Spider-man Homecoming)(see tags/notes for content warnings)Peter Parker can't believe how awesome his life is right now. He has two awesome best friends, an internship with the one-and-only Tony Stark, and a reluctantly supportive aunt. He's even managed to find a girlfriend who likes him despite his... unreliability. (Hey, he can't help it if he has a city to patrol!) Things seem like they're perfect.Until they don't.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> IMPORTANT: trigger warnings for emotional abuse (in relationships), and eventual self-harm and suicidal thoughts.  
> This story revolves around the escalation of an abusive relationship. Please, be careful if you choose to read it. Some of the later chapters could be triggering. 
> 
> This is my first work on AO3, so if you'd like to leave any characterization suggestions, or any comments on how I could improve, please feel free! It should also be noted that, while I have this story planned out, updates might be a little bit infrequent because I'm entering my freshman year of college in the fall. I will not abandon the story, and I will try my best to update it on a fairly frequent basis. 
> 
> With all that being said, I hope you enjoy!

Peter can’t believe how well his day has been going. First, MJ implied that they were friends during AcaDec practice, then Happy picked him up from school, then Mr. Stark offered him a spot as an Avenger. And sure, that last part may have just been a test, but it’s worth mentioning. So when he opens the door to his room upon arriving home, he doesn’t think it can get any better. That is, until he sees what’s sitting on his bed. 

A brown paper bag sits in the middle of his bed, with a note reading: “This belongs to you -TS”. For a second, Peter is confused- when would Mr. Stark have the time to put anything on his bed? In his confusion, he calls out for May- she has to know how this got here, right? -and then he opens up the bag. His eyes widen when he sees a familiar red-and-blue suit.  _ Is this some sort of reward for passing Mr. Stark’s test? _ Peter gingerly lifts the suit out of the bag, holding it away from him as if he’s afraid of it vanishing into thin air. He slips the suit on, taking in the familiar feeling of the fabric on his skin, breathing heavily. Once he’s registered that his suit is a real, material thing that’s not going anywhere anytime soon, he pulls the mask off to stare down at it, eyes wide. As he turns around and looks up, he realizes something: he called out earlier-

“What the fuck?”

-for May. 

Shit. 

“I can explain!” he blurts out, without really thinking. May raises her eyebrows expectantly, as Peter searches for an excuse. “It’s just… a gift from Mr. Stark!”   
Well, there goes any chance of lying his way out of this one. Not that Peter really likes lying to May in the first place; he gets this tight feeling in his chest whenever he has to hide something from her. But in this case, he almost thinks lying might have been better than the lecture he’s about to receive. 

“Peter Parker! What on Earth… this suit… is this why you’ve been losing so many backpacks?... YOU CLIMBED THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT?!?... and Mr. Stark’s internship… I never did like him, but this?… what were you  _thinking, _ you could die!... I have to go make a phone call. This conversation isn’t over, what on Earth made you think this is a good idea?!...” And with that, May turns around and exits the room. She turns around for a moment and adds, “you’re grounded, by the way!”

Peter groans. He knew this would happen if May found out; how could he be so careless? He picks up his phone, his finger hovering over Ned’s contact- and then sets it back down. He knows that the minute May gets off the phone with whoever she’s calling, she’s returning to his room to talk with him for real, and she won’t be happy if he’s already on the phone with Ned when she returns. If she finds out that Ned has been a part of keeping this secret for weeks, she’s going to ground Peter from seeing Ned for even longer. Peter knows that, if his relationship becomes strained with May because of her newfound discovery, he’s going to need to have Ned to fall back on. He can’t risk losing that connection for an extended period of time, and so he chooses to wait until later to contact his best friend. 

It feels like an hour before May finally enters Peter’s bedroom, and Peter can’t help but wonder exactly who she was talking to. Whoever it was, Peter thinks, they must have really upset her; her hair is unkempt, as if she’s run her hand through it repeatedly, and her face is flushed red. Or maybe she’s just upset with Peter; he can’t tell. Before she begins to speak, she inhales deeply. “Tell me everything, from the beginning.” 

Peter flinches at her request, knowing that  _ everything  _ is going to disappoint her greatly. He recalls his return home after the ferry incident, how May mentioned that she had called police stations and Ned’s parents out of concern for Peter’s wellbeing. “May, I’m sorry,” he begins, before recounting the story of how he got his powers. He’s just finishing his explanation of Germany when there’s a knock at the door that sends his heart rate spiking. He suddenly wonders who exactly May had called earlier. His spidey senses aren’t flaring up, so he knows that whoever is at the door is friendly, but that’s really not much of a help. May gives him a look that very clearly says “don’t move” before getting up to answer the door. 

Peter doesn’t hear any conversation between the mysterious visitor and May when the visitor enters the apartment. Even with his heightened senses, he only really hears footsteps that seem to be approaching his room. When the visitor walks into his room, he doesn’t know whether to be relieved or terrified. May, in her rage and concern, decided to call none other than Anthony Edward Stark to the apartment, presumably to lecture Peter about his irresponsibility. Peter refuses to meet Mr. Stark’s eyes as Mr. Stark takes a seat on the bed next to him. 

“Kid, May called about the suit-” Mr. Stark starts. 

“I’m sorry, Mr. Stark. I didn’t mean for this to happen. I’ll hand over the suit now, I’m sorry for disappointing you. I know you wanted me to be better,” Peter interrupts, his voice cracking at the end. His eyes well up with tears as he realizes just how much he’s screwed up. He only had the suit for five minutes before he had to go and ruin everything-

Except, when Mr. Stark interrupts him from his thoughts, it’s not to demand the suit back. “I’m not mad,” he starts. Peter looks up for the first time to meet Mr. Stark’s eyes. “Aunt Hottie called me to yell at me, told me how irresponsible I was for giving a sixteen year old boy a high-tech superhero suit. Thought she was going to murder me, honestly. You’re a good kid, Peter, and we both see that, so you can keep the suit. The reason I’m here in this room  _ again, _ ” Mr. Stark continues, glancing around at the posters that Peter’s added since his first visit, “is because your aunt and I agreed that you need guidelines. I’ve already made a mistake by letting you go around without any guidance; the ferry incident proved that you’re too naive for that. If you break even one of these rules, though, don’t think I’ll hesitate to take the suit back. Kid, I’m just trying to keep you safe; after the Homecoming incident, that’s all that matters to me. I messed up, but I’m going to do better from now on.” Peter examines Mr. Stark’s face for a minute for any sign that he might be joking, but the look in Mr. Stark’s eyes leads Peter to believe that he means everything he says. Peter nods. Mr. Stark pats his back. “May, you can come in now.” 

Aunt May reenters the bedroom and sits down on Peter’s bed, opposite Mr. Stark. “After a long talk, Tony and I have agreed that you need to have a curfew. We’re allowing you to go out and be a hero, but don’t think that means you can ignore your school work. You have to be home by 8 every day so you have time to work on your homework,” she begins. Seeing Peter’s look of protest, she continues, “no exceptions. I’m already scared for my 16-year-old son’s superhero life. You need to alert Tony or me immediately if you’re injured. I want daily updates, too. Just to make sure you’re not getting involved in anything too big. And you have a concern, you come straight to one of us.” May glances over at Mr. Stark, sighing. “Did I forget anything?” 

Mr. Stark takes this as his cue to start speaking again. “I’ve reprogrammed Karen to alert me whenever you sustain an injury that could last for more than a day. Don’t even think about having your friend disable my protocols again, either. Also, there is one thing that I’d like to offer. My lab is a pretty good place for a genius to get some cred in the tech industry. I’d like to offer you a Stark Industries internship, for real, because May told me you’ve been telling all your friends about your internship anyways. Pep already has all the paperwork ready for you to sign. You’ll be coming over twice weekly, on Mondays and Wednesdays, after your academic decathlon practice. Happy’ll pick you up from school, so you don’t need to swing to the compound.” He pauses, before adding, “if that’s okay with you.”

Peter’s eyes widen, and suddenly he finds himself unable to form coherent sentences, so he just nods. Mr. Stark places a hand on his shoulder and looks at him thoughtfully for a moment before getting up from the bed. As he leaves, he turns back to Peter momentarily. “Nice seeing you, kid.” 

Once Mr. Stark is out of the apartment and May has left Peter alone, he finally calls Ned for real, this time with even more new things to tell his friend about.   
As Peter fields questions from a possibly overexcited Ned (who is he kidding, this day definitely warrants overexcitement), he can’t help but think that- even with May finding out about his hobby fighting crime as a vigilante webslinger and calling _Iron Man_ to the apartment for a talk, even with all of the new rules imposed upon his superhero life- Peter can’t believe how well his day has gone. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peter gets detention, and finds out some fairly important things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! If you've stuck with me thus far, thank you! I hope you're having a great day! Also, I already have an update! (Surprise!)

The next day at school, Peter can't think about anything except the events of the past week. Of course it's just his luck that the one time he finds a date for a school dance, her dad turns out to be a villain dressed in a bird suit whose aim is to steal technology from his mentor. Of course he has to manually steer a plane into a safe crashing spot and fight said bird suit villain-

"Ow! What the fuck?" 

Peter looks up to see a guy staring at him in disgust. The student in question towers over Peter by around a half foot, and he's pretty sure he's seen this guy around before, playing football. His name might be Gavin? George? Anyways, whoever he is, he bends down and starts to gather his books from the floor- wait, why are his books on the floor? Peter realizes that, in his inattention, he accidentally knocked into Gavin(?), causing him to drop the textbooks he was carrying. 

"Hey man, I'm really sorry-" Peter begins, before he's cut off by Gavin's death glare.

"Get lost."

Peter looks at the time and picks up the pace to his locker, wanting to leave time to talk to Ned. Right, Ned! Last night, Ned had mentioned something about a Star Wars marathon this evening, and Peter is super excited. Except since it's a school night, they can't marathon the whole series, so Peter isn't sure exactly which films they're watching later. Peter suddenly recalls why he called Ned last night anyways-

Peter accidentally runs straight into a senior girl who's looking at her phone while walking. He apologizes profusely before finally reaching his locker. Anyways, he's really looking forward to Chemistry today, he knows he needs to refresh his batch of web fluid and he's pretty sure that today is just a review of some Chemistry history that he already knows anyways. What he's not looking forward to is gym- he sustained a lot of injuries in the homecoming incident, and while they've mostly healed up well thanks to his healing factor, he does have a weird bruise on his knee that gym shorts will most definitely show off. It was probably a pretty deep bruise, so he doesn't know whether to be concerned about it or not; maybe it will heal by then and it won't even be a problem. He really wishes he didn't have to take gym in the first place, with his powers. It's just a waste of time, not to mention how inconvenient it-

"Peter, are you even listening to me? If we don't get going, we'll be late for homeroom!" 

Peter looks up when he feels someone tap on his shoulder repeatedly. Oh. In his daze, he's managed to completely tune out his best friend, who must have appeared at his locker while he was sorting through his books. The hallway has cleared out significantly in the past few minutes, and he cusses mentally before hightailing it to homeroom with Ned not far behind. The bell rings immediately after he walks through the door, and he lets out a sigh of relief.

There's not much of interest on the student news this morning, although Peter could care less about the news on an interesting day. Jason Ionello and Betty Brant go on and on about the new Decathlon team captain, and the upcoming band performance, and the robotics club's latest venture. 

Ned taps Peter on the shoulder. "Peter, you never answered my question. Do you want to start with Episode IV today, or Episode I?"

"On the one hand, we haven't watched the original trilogy in a while. On the other hand, young Anakin? Dude, don't make me choose!"

"Episode IV it is! Hey, do you think that I could meet Mr. Stark sometime? Now that you're spending time together and all? Dude, I still can't believe that you get to go to the Avengers compound! What even is your life? I can't believe that someone I know..." 

The conversation continues even as the bell rings, signaling the next class period, and doesn't come to a halt until Peter and Ned have to split up for the next class. Physics. Although Peter doesn't dislike physics, per se, he doesn't exactly love the class either. He understood the concepts ages ago, and the class feels useless. He pulls out his laptop, ready to waste the class period watching videos of his stunts; however, when he checks the news for the day, he notices a familiar name- Tony Stark- in the headlines. He stops scrolling to click on the headline, wondering what exactly Mr. Stark did this time to make the news. The page seems to take forever to load. He's about to click refresh for the third time when-

"Alright, everybody. Put your electronics away. Yes, Mr. Parker, that includes you. Don't think I don't notice you on your laptop every class period."

His teacher begins to pass out pieces of paper. When he sees the headline, he groans internally. A pop quiz? Now? Really? 

By the time Peter is finished with his pop quiz, he's forgotten about the curious headline in the news. As the teacher begins her lecture for the day, he doesn't try to pull out his laptop again, instead opting to doodle his web fluid formula in the margins of his work. By the time his class is finished and he moves on to Chemistry, his mind is back on the Star Wars marathon and which snacks he should bring. 

Peter was right. Chemistry today is just a review of some of the important scientists who discovered the concepts they're working on right now. The class is instructed to go through some simple lab work revolving around these concepts, and then to read a chapter from the textbook about their discovery and significance. Thankfully, this means that Peter's in the lab today; he still has the chance to work on his web fluid under his desk. As Peter works through the experiment (simple, really, he could do this one in his sleep), he stirs the familiar chemicals under his desk. In his efforts to multitask, he somehow misses the footsteps behind him, the prickling of his spider sense alerting him to a situation he doesn't want to be in. 

"Mr. Parker! What on Earth are you doing?"

Peter looks up to make eye contact with his chemistry teacher, Mr. Cobbwell, who very clearly has noticed his side experiment. Mr. Cobbwell's eyes search the labels of the various chemicals that Peter keeps under his desk, landing on a particularly concentrated chemical littered with various warning labels. Somehow, he manages to completely ignore the safe but rather suspicious contents of Peter's beaker. Peter lets out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. If Mr. Cobbwell put two and two together, he'd have his cover blown for the second time in a week, and this time, he's pretty sure that Mr. Stark would be really pissed with him. It occurs to him that lab time with Mr. Stark could possibly allow Peter to spend some time mixing his web fluid in a setting that wouldn't risk his cover being blown, and if he'd just thought ahead, Peter could've totally avoided the situation he's in right now, with a teacher breathing down his neck for conducting unapproved experiments. Then again, when does Peter ever think ahead?

"I can explain, sir!" Peter starts. His heart sinks when he realizes that he can't, in fact, explain this particular set of circumstances. 

"Well? I'm waiting." Mr. Cobbwell somehow looks more intimidating than ever in this moment. 

"I was... curious to see what would happen?"  _ Wow, Peter, that was such a good explanation .  _

"These chemicals could've burned your skin off! This lab is not a playground! Detention, for the next week, after school. And I expect to never catch you doing this again. You're going to put these back where they belong-" Mr. Cobbwell gestures to the various chemicals that Peter has been working with- "and I'm going to be keeping a closer eye on you from now on. If I ever catch you doing this again, well, you'll be lucky if you're not expelled."

This incident leaves Peter downtrodden for the rest of the day. What is he going to tell Mr. Stark? He knows that May is going to find out about this, considering she's his guardian; what's she going to think? Worst of all, he has to cancel or move his lab time tomorrow, considering he can't go home right after school. 

Before he knows it, Peter is sitting in a desk in a mostly empty room, being lectured on his morals by none other than the man he fought less than a year ago. His eyes wander, and he realizes that he doesn't actually recognize the only other occupant of the room. She's already looking at him, and her eyes meet his. Her expression is one of utter boredom. She rolls her eyes dramatically. 

"Can you believe that we're lectured every time we get in trouble by a war criminal? Seriously? He needs to take his own damn advice," the girl drawls sarcastically. 

Peter laughs and leans forwards. "So, you've got detention." he says in the most cheesy voice he can muster. His movements are exaggerated as he imitates Cap's iconic "disappointed" pose. He's heard this lecture enough times that he could probably recite the entire thing by memory if he wanted. He's just pondering when and why Captain America recorded an entire series of cheesy PSAs when the girl speaks up again.

"So, what did you do to get detention? Were you one minute late to Mr. Harrington's class? Did you kick a puppy?" 

Peter considers what he should say. Obviously, he can't give her the full answer- she'd want to know more details than he'd be able to give her. So he comes up with a half-truth. "Wasn't paying attention in Chemistry, and the teacher noticed," he replies. He conveniently forgets the part where he was caught with a bunch of chemicals he shouldn't have, and the part where he was busy making web fluid in the middle of a completely unrelated lab. 

The girl laughs. "Seriously? Cobbwell put you in detention for that?"

Peter changes the subject quickly before she can think too much about his answer. "Anyways, why are you in here?"

The girl doesn't answer for a few seconds. She sits there, staring at him with furrowed eyebrows. Great. Now he's screwed up and she's not going to talk to him. He's probably hit some sensitive subject or something, and that's why she doesn't want to tell him. Not for the first time today, he mentally scolds himself for his lack of foresight.

"I didn't turn in a paper because I was too busy watching Lord of the Rings the night before it was due," the girl suddenly blurts out, interrupting his train of thought. "I'm Zoe Hughes, by the way. You're Peter Parker, right? I've heard things about you."

Peter looks up in surprise. "Yeah, that's me. You like Lord of the Rings?" He's caught off guard by the fact that this girl is into the same geeky stuff as him. Last time a girl from the popular group at school (at least, he kind of thinks she's popular? That would explain why he doesn't recognize her at all- he doesn't have a place in that crowd) heard him talking about something like that, she gave him a look of utter disgust and walked further away. 

"Of course! How could I not? J.R.R. Tolkien is a literary genius!" Zoe looks almost offended by Peter's surprise. Peter is about to laugh at her expression when he notices-

"Is that a Star Wars shirt?"

Zoe looks down at her shirt for a second- it has an outline of Darth Vader and reads "I am your father"- and laughs. "Yeah, it was the first shirt I saw this morning. Why are you so surprised? I thought we just established that I'm a huge nerd."

Not for the first time, Peter grins at Zoe's words. "I love Star Wars! I'm having a marathon tonight with my friend Ned- I don't know if you know him- but anyways, we're starting at Episode IV and I don't know how far we'll be able to go because it's a school night and I couldn't go over right away because I have detention, but you've probably already noticed that- anyways, it's been like a month since I've actually watched this part of the series and that's ridiculous, even though we just finished working on the Lego Death Star a couple weeks ago, that's not the same as watching the movies- who's your favorite character? I kind of love Chewbacca..." Peter trails off when he realizes how long he's been ranting, and anyways, he's kind of out of breath. Zoe's giving him this kind of amused, tilted-head smile.

"Peter Parker, you might be as much of a nerd as I am. Anyways, I'm more of a Han Solo gal. 'Don't get cocky"? Iconic. And the Millennium Falcon?" Zoe laughs. "Why haven't we talked before?"

Detention goes by fast, Peter and Zoe continuing to banter easily about Star Wars. At the end of detention, Zoe gets up and shakes Peter's hand. "I look forward to seeing you again," she says. Peter watches her leave the room, grinning. When he's leaving the school, he's so distracted that he nearly goes home instead of to Ned's house. Once he's finally at Ned's house, settled down on the couch with snacks and A New Hope playing, he can't help but think about Zoe every time Han is on screen. 

\- - - - - 

Later that day, once Peter's gone home for the night (after a short patrol,), he sits down and reopens his laptop. He suddenly remembers the article that he'd seen before, the one that said something about Tony Stark. He finally loads the article and gasps at the headline. "Tony Stark and Pepper Potts Announce Engagement." He skims the article once and then just stares at his computer. How could he not know about this? He looks at the date of the article and realizes that it's dated for the day before, the day of his fake Avengers invitation. The article mentions that the announcement came in a press conference at the Avengers compound that day. Mr. Stark must have gotten engaged right after Peter left the compound that day. That means that the reporters were already present when Peter was at the compound, which could mean-

No. That couldn't be right. 

But thinking about it more, Peter can't come up with any other explanation. Mr. Stark hadn't mentioned the press conference to Peter, except when he said that there were a bunch of reporters waiting for Peter's Avenger announcement. But that was a test, right? There was no way that Mr. Stark was serious about that? 

Peter thinks about it for a while, realizing that the time stamp of the press conference matches up with the exact time of Peter's departure and realizes that either the offer was real, or Mr. Stark intentionally scheduled a press conference about his engagement for immediately after his conversation with Peter, and then decided to not mention that to Peter while he was there. He knows that he's not close to Mr. Stark, by any means, but he'd think that Mr. Stark would mention that? 

He's distracted from pondering this conundrum for any longer by another notification on his laptop, this for a new article that mentions the Avengers in the headline. Peter clicks it to open it up. When he reads the headline, he is taken by surprise a second time. "Talks of Peace with Rogue Avengers?" The article is written in the form of an interview with Mr. Stark himself, which makes sense, because Peter knows that Mr. Stark was heavily involved in the situation with the Accords that caused the Avengers to become rogue in the first place. The interview mostly talks about Mr. Stark's regret for his friends being considered war criminals, as well as the possibility of working out a deal with the Rogue Avengers for a pardon. He mentions that there have been talks behind the scenes for a while, but it's been really difficult trying to make both sides happy here, and he's not sure how long it will be before anything comes out of this. 

Peter recalls the airport fight in Germany, how Mr. Stark really didn't seem like he wanted to be fighting in the first place, how Mr. Stark benched him at the first sign of any injury, how nobody there really seemed happy to be fighting. He's kind of relieved that there might be peace talks in the works, because he saw how unhappy everyone was to be fighting, he saw firsthand how much the situation stressed out Mr. Stark. He knows that Mr. Stark only wanted accountability for civilian deaths, and he can tell that he was unhappy with how much the situation escalated. Maybe after everything is worked out, Mr. Stark can introduce him properly to the Rogues? Peter was glad to fight on the right side of the law, he really wouldn't want to be a fugitive, but it would be really cool to meet some of these people outside of a fight. 

Speaking of Mr. Stark, however, it’s time for Peter to figure out the whole detention situation. He knows he can’t have his internship tomorrow after school, but he’s really not looking forward to explaining his mistake to his mentor. 

Reluctantly, Peter picks up his phone and dials Mr. Stark’s number. “Hey Mr. Stark? I may or may not have made a huge mistake…”


End file.
